Untold Thousands of Dead Worms Plague Ohio

From Louisville to Cincinnati to Dayton to Cleveland, beginning yesterday afternoon there have been thousands upon untold thousands of earthworms coming out of the ground which have subsequently ‘fried’ on the surface from the rays of the sun.

Some local mainstream media outlets are reporting that the cause of the earthworm die-off is from heavy rain or acidic soil. The problem is, some of the reported areas have been dry, and certainly not all of Ohio soil has suddenly become ‘acidic’.

Another explanation is that it is mating season for earthworms (the Spring), when they often come out of the ground and get trapped on the concrete or hard surfaces, and eventually die from the sun’s rays.

The thing is, I don’t recall having heard of this kind of mass earthworm doom-and-gloom occurring on such a wide scale, and found it interesting given the fact that so many other animal die-off’s have been reported during this past year.

Using logic to try and determine why so many worms have died across such a wide expanse of land, nearly all at the same time, I ask myself, what makes a worm come out of the ground?

Who would’ve thought… and earthquake in Ohio?? It may be that the earthworms there knew something. Or, maybe the explanation remains waterlogged soil throughout the State?

There has been some comment regarding the ground water aquifer in Ohio, being similarly located along the ‘worm-kill’ zone. Here is a map with the blue color indicating available ground water.
Ohio Ground Water Aquifer Map

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33 Comments

I like the “canary-in-the-coal-mine” theory/read between the lines, potential you used in summation. Between this and your 1 million hits post ( knew that was coming with the 976,000 hits notation, given the numbers the future was evident ) if you had the energy you would be writing that page right about Thursday? I congratulate M.S.B. as all have done or thought. Also I like what you wrote on the January 23rd 2010 1:01 post. Hope all continues smoothly and that stress you left behind in the past comes back home with you both with the return of health. Survive-All…P.S. Looking up something on-point re: die offs, will get back with address…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WizDDYg03tM This is not directly related to Ohio but, in the big picture it is new information to insert into the equations anyone following these times will see. Survive-All… Previous wishes read without the clarity meant. May recent stress be left behind, as when you left behind work/system stress in the past.

This is an odd event indeed. I have seen lots of mass worm movement during rain storms. We see it quite frequently on our farm, there will be thousands of worms come to the surface during a good rain and then they head back below when the sun comes out and it begins to dry.

When it is dry, we never see worms out and as you pointed out, there are dry conditions in much of that area and it is highly unlikely that the whole area suddenly become acidic. Does make you wonder if there was some sort of electrical or seismic generated current/vibration that caused the mass exodus.

It looks more or less like the normal result of a saturated ground due to rain followed by sun. Not uncommon at all to see worms die from crawling out onto pavement and being dried by the sun. Admittedly there are more worms then normal but this could simply be a result of an abundance of wqorms in general. The key would be to survey the worm population left. If there are lots of worms in the ground then this is not a significant event. If on the other hand all the worms are gone then indeed something serious has happened. I’m betting there is no shortage of worms in Ohio. One last thing, there is no “dry” land in Ohio in the spring. It may get sunny now and then but rain is a fact of life in the Midwest in the spring.

I’ll go with nature stirring again within the earth. Poss earthquake or the likes on the way. With the amount of animals that have died this year alone there is still no certain answer as to why! do the ‘powers that be’ really believe that we ‘all’ have our heads in the sand! they know what is going on for sure! thank goodness we are out of the sand with blinkers off!
thank goodness for this site that keeps us updated cos it wont be all over the news! will it ??
Stay safe! stay prepared!

Im trying to figure out why there are dead earthworms everywhere. It has not rained so that is not it. Dead earthworms started appearing last week on sidewalks, curbs, etc. Only saw a few new dead ones today on our walkway. My only guess is that the soil is getting to hot and they are to dumb or cannot live at greater depths. I think they started appearing last week when the heat index was 113 degrees. I live in Charleston SC, no earthquake as of yet. Any ideas?

This has also been happening in a particular part of St. George, Staten Island in NYC. I moved there ever since June 2002 to this current year 2013. It is certainly crazy because I have never seen such a phenomenon before. My senses told me that something was heating up down in the ground for all of those worms to come up out of the dirt like that. In 2007, riding in the subway I smelled sulfur reeking in the number 1 train tunnel. That was year I believe a pipeline bursed under an upper east side street.

I’m not an expert in geology but something is certainly happening underheath us

I live in NC and this happened a few days ago. A mass of worms dead on the sidewalks. Never seen this before. I will say, NC had a rainy summer but a dry spell for about two weeks..now this. Concerned!

My yard has always had lots of worms, people even come to get them for fishing, but for the last week hundreds of them are on top of the ground dead. No rain in a while, plenty of worms left, every time you pick up a stick or move something there are LOTS of them under it.

people I live in Fontana California and u want to study worms in the last maybe month my yard is letting outthousands all over my drive way filling up a gallon bucket every two to three days becoming a pain and does have me concern whats really going on and thanks to all that has posted there thoughts on this subject I had no idea how manney people have or seen this problem.

This is also happening in Middle Georgia. I noticed that we had literally hundreds of dead earthworms on our patio and driveway. Now I am seeing them in the yard. This morning I must of picked up dozens that were squirming and barely alive and deposited them to a cool spot of dirt under my shrubs. It really concerns me because without the worms to turn over and fertilize the soil, who know what else would start dying off. I also have an older Golden Retriever who had started eating these worms off of the ground and she developed a toxic liver and nearly died from it. Now I have to monitor every second she is outside because she seems driven to continue snacking on the worms.

I know there is a more current comment on large worm die offs, but couldnt find it so i just searched “worms” on this blog..

am curious, if anyone has noticed
are these regular garden earthworms?
are folks noticing these huge amounts of dead worms on their gardens/lawns, or are they off on pavements/sidewalks?

back when i was a kid (about a hundred yrs ago..grin), the only time, and it was seldom, we saw some of this was after a long heavy rain. back then it seemed like the water saturated the soil/air pockets, and they came up for air/died..

this current worm die off issues does not seem to be similar. reports i recall, are not suggesting it is restricted to heavy rain periods????

I Live in Connecticut and have had a similar experience with hundreds of dead Earthworms in my driveway. I’m 68 YO, and have never seen anything like this before. It has been a hot summer, with temps. on many days 90+, with little rain. Also, I don’t put any chemicals on my yard. It is very strange.

I live in Allentown, Pa – beginning about 2 weeks ago the parking lot of our church had some earthworms on the macadam. Today my husband and I spent 2 hours using a rake to collect the dead worms(we ended up with two 5 gallon buckets). We have chickens, they love them. Don’t understand why this is happening.

We live in Great Meadows NJ. About 2-3 weeks ago out of no where suddenly in the early morning hours, hundreds upon hundreds perhaps thousands of earth worms come springing out of the ground. Our dogs have tried playing with them and probably have eaten a few. There is no end in sight of this and the problem gets worse day by day. Today we tried to vacuum up the dead worms from the sidewalk and others were literally shooting out of the ground in to the air apparently from the vibration of the vacuum. If anyone has any ideas please respond here, we would really appreciate advice on a solution.

That is just disgusting. I saw a movie long time ago about worms taking over a house. Don’t remember the name.
Wonder if worms can tell when earthquake or other is coming/happening?
I scrolled up & read other posts & noticed most are on the East coast.
Are people on West coast having the same problem??
I live in Charlotte NC & it’s in the center of the state.
No problems here that I have noticed with worms.
Snakes yes but not worms.